Possession
by MyAlias
Summary: Sydney and Vaughn and one more chance.
1. The Night is My Companion

A/N: So obviously I don't own Alias. It all belongs to J.J. Abrams, ABC, Bad Robot, etc. I also don't own anything relating to the song 'Possession,' by Sarah McLachlan. I might end up using lyrics from the song, or maybe not, but it inspired this story and I used some lyrics for chapter titles.  
  
This takes place a few weeks after The Frame, but it's not really crucial to the story.  
  
I hope this makes sense. Enjoy.  
  
Possession  
  
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My purse hits the wooden floor with a loud thud as my body crumples onto my bed. I was in Cape Town last night. Or was it yesterday morning? With the 13 hour time difference and the 25 hour flight, it's difficult to remember.  
  
Or maybe it wasn't even Cape Town. Maybe that was last week. It's not really important though. It never matters anymore. There's always going to be another mission in another trendy part of another far away city. I'll continue putting on leather mini skirts and stilettos, over-applying eye shadow, and pretending to be a 24 year-old so I can ingratiate myself into the clueless crowds.   
  
And now I have these bruises again. After a few minutes of preparation, I muster enough strength to heave my body off the bed and walk towards the mirror over the bureau. I strain my eyes to make out my reflection. The sickening yellow and purple mixture underneath my skin is peeking through the foundation I applied yesterday night. Or yesterday morning. Whenever it was...  
  
It turns out that when I know I'm coming home to an empty house, I don't really mind if my make-up doesn't make it home from Africa.  
  
Slowly I unbutton my black jacket. It falls to the floor. I cross my arms and pull my charcoal gray tank top over my head in one fluid motion. With my eyes focused on the mirror, I undo the zipper on the back of my skirt, which slowly slides down my calves. Now I'm standing here in pastel pink, cotton undergarments, which are completely unflattering. It doesn't matter, though, since no one will be seeing them anytime soon.   
  
I stare at my broken body in the mirror and have trouble believing it belongs to me. I run my hand over my abdomen, over the scar I've had since I returned, over the bluish blotches on my ribs, over my chest and my neck until I reach my face. My lip is cut. My cheek is bruised. My eyes are overflowing with tears.   
  
I open the top drawer and remove a black camisole. I drop it over my head and it falls gently over my wounded rib cage. I pull my gray, cotton pajama pants out of the drawer, too, and gently pull them over my legs. I tie the drawstring so they loosely fall over my hips.   
  
I shuffle into the bathroom and lift my blue toothbrush out of its holder. I remember a time when there would have been two brushes in that holder. I cringe as I remember that for a moment I had allowed myself to believe his toothbrush would return.   
  
He would have used to it to erase the taste of that cup of coffee we were going to have.  
  
But that cup of coffee was supposed to be weeks ago. It never happened. It never will. My toothbrush is lonely.  
  
I brush, I spit, I rinse. I splash my face with warm water and linger a moment buried in the towel before wiping the wetness of my face. I pull my hair out of its pony tail and it falls messily over my shoulders.  
  
My feet are sore. My eyes are tired. My bruises actually ache. My cabinet is crowded with Tylenol and Advil and even leftover prescription painkillers, but why mask the pain? It's still going to hurt tomorrow. I might as well get used to it tonight.  
  
Mainly, I'm just exhausted. I fold my comforter down and fluff my pillow and sit on the edge of the bed. In a few minutes, I'll sink into the realm of dreams, or nightmares, whatever the case may be.   
  
And then the phone rings. I consider not answering, but it's hard to ignore a phone call when you receive it at one in the morning.  
  
"Hello?" I ask, barely whispering.  
  
"Sydney," Vaughn begins.   
  
I swallow hard. I know what I have to do, and it hurts. But after the last few weeks, I don't have any other choice. "Good night, Vaughn," I say, sliding my finger over the off button and getting ready to press down.  
  
"Sydney, wait!" he demands. "I'm at the door. Your door. Do you think you could let me in?"  
  
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As long as you guys like this, I'll be glad to finish it. I'd love any feedback you have and I hope you enjoyed this. Thanks for reading!!! 


	2. And Solitude My Guide

When Sydney died, and I forgot how to smile, I used to drink. It took me a few months to realize alcohol was the cliché thing to do. If I was going to wallow in self-pity, I might as well be creative.  
  
Now, I usually wind up in the car, circling a neighborhood. Any neighborhood, really. As long as it's not mine. I figure it's better for my liver. It's too bad that drowning one's sorrows in gasoline and meditating to the lull of the engine is such an expensive habit these days.  
  
I didn't get to go to Cape Town with Sydney and Weiss. The way I said that, it sounds as if I wasn't chosen for the middle school baseball team and now I'm feeling sorry for myself. I think a better analogy would be a party in high school, one of those parties that everyone went to, but I wasn't allowed to go because my mom found out there weren't going to be parents there. So while I was sitting on my worn green sofa drinking Pepsi and watching a hockey game, my friends were out with the cool girls having fun.  
  
Wait. Maybe that's not a good analogy. There was nothing fun about that mission. And Sydney got hurt. She always gets hurt. I used to think she got hurt more than anyone else, but not anymore. Now I think it's equal.  
  
They put me in charge of base ops. I guess they thought that by doing that they could avoid saying what they really wanted to, which is "Since your wife and her young, British boy-toy recently tortured you and left you for dead, we're not really sure you're quite ready to get back out there."   
  
So they made me stay and work at the office and sit at one of those computers in the rotunda with Marshall, double checking security systems and fail safes and the infrared satellite surveillance system and whatever else we usually do at base ops. Someone has to do it, I guess. And I was okay with it because I still get to talk to her through a com and a secure satellite connection. Except that she's spent the last 25 hours on an airplane, incommunicado. And she doesn't want to talk to me. Because she hates me now, or at least she's trying to.  
  
For the past day, while she's been 35,000 feet up in a cushy government jet, I've been on the ground, suffocating in smog, looking up at the sky and wondering.  
  
Will she still be mad when she gets home?   
  
I had to doubt her when she told me my wife was a traitor. It was stupid, but I had to. And when she'd forgiven me for doubting her, I had to beg her not to search out her sister. I had to.   
  
After all, if Sydney Bristow dies again, no amount of alcohol or aimless driving is going to numb the agony that will surge through my veins, directly into my heart. So I told her what not to do, which is exactly what she wanted to do. And now I think she's given up on me.   
  
It's 12:15 in the morning and I'm still driving. The little orange fuel light is about to start shining, but I'll drive until I can feel the fumes powering the engine, and then I'll stop at Texaco and pay $1.96 a gallon to feed my habit.   
  
My phone rings. It's the call I've been waiting for. It's Weiss. "We're home," he announces.   
  
"How is she?" I ask.  
  
"She's fine, Vaughn. Don't worry." I can tell from the tone in his voice that he's lying. But I accept the lie because it's easier that way. Hell, I might as well add another lie while we're at it.   
  
"I'm not worried."  
  
"See you tomorrow?"  
  
"Yeah." Tomorrow is Saturday. We both know we'll end up at work.   
  
It's 12:45. I don't really know how that happened. Wasn't it just 12:15? Didn't he just call? I guess time flies when you're absorbed in memories of a tall brunette with deep brown eyes and a smile that would make Julia Roberts jealous. But that can't be true, because if it were, the last five years would have flown by. She is, after all, the only thing I've thought about since the day we met.   
  
I guess I just lost track of time. And now the orange light is shining and I can hear the engine scratching and maybe a little unleaded would solve this problem.   
  
I don't want to stop the car. I hate stopping the car. When I stop driving, whatever thoughts I was sorting out stop being sorted and they simply cascade over me and drown me and it's hard to breathe because I can only see Sydney and think about Sydney and breathe Sydney. And she hates me.  
  
So somehow I've become one of those men who can stand at a gas pump at 12:47 in the morning and think only about some woman he doesn't have.   
  
When did that happen to me?  
  
Actually I can tell you exactly when it happened. Just like I can tell you exactly the way she smells, exactly the way she grins while she's brushing her teeth and white foam is seeping out the corners of her mouth and she doesn't even care because she knows she looks beautiful anyway, exactly the way she twirls her hair in her fingers when she's at work and she doesn't know anyone is looking, exactly the way she used to whisper my name when I woke up next to her.   
  
It's 12:52. I'm driving again. I don't remember having returned to my car, or turning on the engine, or pressing the accelerator and entering the road. That scares me a little bit.   
  
And suddenly I'm parked in front of a house I've never had the privilege of entering. She's probably home by now; her house isn't far from the airport. I want so desperately to knock, to pretend like nothing has changed. Maybe she'll feel the same way. Maybe she'll let me in.  
  
I'm scared, because after all this driving I've come to one conclusion. This really is my last chance. Sydney's been resurrected and my marriage has decomposed and if she were to let me in it would just be us. Just like before, except profoundly more sad.   
  
I'm leaning against my car now. It's 12:58. Since I stopped the car, all those thoughts are back. The ones that starve me for air. At this point, her front door is my only life preserver.   
  
I take out my cell phone and press speed-dial number one. Sydney was always number one. Lauren used to be number two. Now number two is blessedly empty.   
  
"Hello?" she answers, barely whispering.   
  
Thank God she answered, I tell myself.  
  
"Sydney," I manage to respond as I shuffle to the front door.  
  
"Good night, Vaughn," she says flatly. I know she is going to hang up. She can't hang up. She can't.  
  
"Sydney, wait!" I half-shout into the phone. "I'm at the door. Your door. Do you think you could let me in?"  
  
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Sorry about the amount of time it took for me to get this up, I kept waiting for something juicy to happen on the show that would completely invalidate my story, but nothing yet. I also apologize for any typos in this chapter; it's really late and I'm really tired. I hope you liked this chapter. Thanks for reading and for all the reviews for the last chapter. If you guys like this, I should be able to write the ending soon! Thanks! 


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